My Weekend

Edited to add: Aaaaannnnddd.....I was assigned to medical staff! So for encampment, I'll be checking cadets for blisters and making sure they all stay healthy.

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I had a relatively interesting Saturday. It started at 3 am and ended around 11:30 when I crashed on a cot of dubious quality.

I applied for a cadet staff position at the NY Wing encampment, which is this July. Last weekend was an encampment staff workshop. Essentially, it's where the cadet and senior staff members get together, have some classes, and the cadets get evaluated and possibly interviewed for the positions they applied for.

So Saturday morning, my alarm started going off at 3 am. And I was disciplined and actually got myself out of bed right away and didn't fall back asleep like I typically do. Plus, it would have been embarrassing to show up late for my ride (or miss my ride!) just cause I didn't get up. So I got up. And I hopped into my BDUs, grabbed my backpack and sleeping bag, and gathered up some breakfast. My mom drove me up to Buffalo, and Hosanna came along to give us company. We found the rendezvous point without difficulty, and the other cadet who was riding there too showed up as well. Maj A, our driver, overslept by five minutes (ha! so glad it wasn't me!), but he got there right around 5 am. I got to ride shotgun the whole way out to Scotia. It was roughly a 4 hour drive...one 5 minute break, and the rest was straight cruising.  All I can say about the driving is I sure hope Maj A didn't pay too much for his music CDs. I hope someone gives him new music CDs for Father's Day. Hey...a person can hope, right?

We arrived around 9 am. We signed in with the registrar and plunged into a full day of activities and people. There were classes (held in the dining hall) and group leadership projects. For the classes, I propped myself up at a random table and looked awake and cognizant. I also took notes to help appear more functional. Some of the classes were on time management, what leadership is not, and goal setting.

The group leadership projects were more hands on. I was assigned to bravo flight, and we had 10 people in our group. We would go to the assigned location where we were given an assignment. We would go about completing this assignment (example: a treasure hunt, minus a treasure at the end, but complete with the difficult to understand, rhyming clues) while being followed by senior members with clipboards. And we did rather quite well, I thought. We came together as a team, we listened to each other, and we had some people who were able to stand out as good group leaders. And there's nothing like listening to  and participating in a 45 minute long guided discussion on fairness, justice, and leadership with a group of young teens. It made me feel better about the future of America.

We switched between classes and GLPs until about 6:30 or 7 (with breaks for lunch and supper), and then we watched a movie (Remember the Titans, if anyone's interested). Then it was time to clean up the dining hall (in which I managed not to fall asleep while sweeping), shower, and go to bed. I was assigned to Cabin 2, and I found an empty cot to stash myself and my stuff, and I slept quite well. Except for the crows. You know...some people have annoying roosters that wake you up before dawn with their noise. The Stratton Air National Guard Base doesn't have roosters-- it has crows, parked conveniently in the trees surrounding the cabins we slept in. And I detest every single one of them. Who needs alarm clocks when you have crows?

Anyhow, Sunday morning was getting up, packing, eating breakfast, and going home.  I got back around 2 or 3.

Obviously, the end result of the workshop was to be selected for staff. However, until the staff positions have all been officially announced on the NYWG website, I can't say what position (if any) I got. So I'm gonna just publish this as is right now, and when it's formally announced, I'll just to an "edited to add" thingy at the top.

Maystuff

Yo...sup? It's May, and it's warm and green here. I'm listening to the Cocoanut's playlist and blogging.So anyhow...last blog post I alluded to the upcoming and eminent visit of the D family (Kevin's family). Now I shall proceed to blog the pictures that I found on my camera. I love when I plug my camera into my computer, copy them over, look through the pics, and discover lots of cool shots that I didn't take.

Jess and Kevin had a safe trip up. They got here a little after 7 Wednesday evening, a full half hour before googlemaps said they'd be here O_O Speaking of whom...here's Mr. Green Shirt himself:

 He and Josh had a very manly arm wrestling competition after the oldest kids got back from visiting Elizabeth and Reuben that evening. 

 The next day, all of us kids (minus Josh and Katrina) went shopping for groceries for the weekend. Who knew that Aldis and Walmart were so...umm...interesting? We had time to stop at The Green Tearoom for smoothies and hot drinks before heading home. Then we took a walk, went to the Civil Air Patrol open house, and came home. The rest of the family had *just* gotten there like 10 minutes before us, so we walked in and met the family. They're such sweet people, and we enjoyed getting to know them.

Here we have Mr. and Mrs. D, Catherine (the youngest), and a camera-shy Josh.

 This is Lisa, Michael, Andrew, and Stephen. We were sad that Christina (their oldest) had a prior commitment and couldn't come.    

 And wow...apparently one of my siblings was creeping on Mrs. D??

 This is Josh's Nerf gun. And yes, the only reason I knew what it was was because it is written on the side of the gun. Josh had such a blast playing with boys and guns...the boys brought some guns with them. I'd tell you what sort of gun they are, but I haven't the foggiest.

 Ah, Mr. and Mrs. D, in a candid moment.

 Delicious cookies being reserved for Friday night supper.

 A Nerf...bullet?

 Saturday morning, we all went to the Luensman (sp?) Overview Park. We admired the view and took a nature hike. This is me taking a picture and telling everyone to look casual.

 Some of us ran down to the bottom of the hill, and some of us remained on top and took pictures of those of us who ran.

 Then we started out on our hike. It was like a mile long, and it was perfect.

 In which I take a picture of someone taking a picture of someone taking a picture.

Me: "Michael! Look epic!"
Michael: *smiles*

Stephen leads Catherine, Hosanna, and Kevin on a daring venture.

Hosanna and Joanna strike stunning poses. 

Lydia tears a small tree apart and goes on a violent rampage.

 The party poses for a group picture, taken by a friendly hiker.

 Kevin bounces Katrina up and down on a branch.

 Lisa explores across a downed log.

 And we found an adorable salamander!

That evening, we had a few friends over for a picnic and kickball...sadly, I have no pictures of this. The next day, we went to church, came home, had lunch, played some games, and then bid our guests goodbye. They made it safely home around midnight. Andrew has a lot of super awesome pictures on his camera, so if he puts them online, I'll try to at least post a link.

Thanks for reading!

[snapshot]

I love doing these little snapshot-of-our-day posts. Anyhow, right now, I am baking these cookies, and I just finished baking these cookies. My mom's making supper, my dad's at work, and the rest of the kids are cleaning/doing schoolwork. Except Jessica. She finished her junior year at college yesterday (and I have to add this caveat--technically, I'm not sure if she has all the credits by PHC's standards, but whatever!) and is even now as I type driving home. Actually riding. She and Kevin will be here later on this evening, and then Kevin's family will be coming in later tomorrow night. We're looking forward to hanging out with them over the weekend!

So quite naturally, the last few days weeks have been spent cleaning, cleaning, and...more cleaning! We started with Grandpa's house. That needed a maaaajor cleaning up. Picture an arthritic, elderly man living in a home alone for about 20 years, and just picture the dust...the cobwebs...the grime...the mold in the fridge...the clutter...the dirty clothing... If I were Roman Catholic, I think we'd all deserve sainthood right now. Anyhow, his house looks roughly 14,000 times better. Our house needed some decluttering, some finishing up of painting projects, and mowing of lawns. Plus about a million other things. But now we are down to slightly under a million things left to do!

Historically speaking, we've kept somewhat busy over the past couple weeks, or whenever it was I posted last. Grandpa continues to do better at the nursing home. We hope to bring him home to his house this weekend after his doctor's appointment on Friday.

I'm sure I have a lot of pictures and stuff all begging to be blogged, but they're all upstairs, and I'm not. Okay...I'm taking the last batch of cookies out of the oven, eating a tad (we're waiting on supper proper till Jess and Kevin, aka Sparky, get here) and then making sure that everything's cleaned that needs to be. Adios!